Thursday, February 19, 2015

Incest now "Genetic Sexual Attraction" (WARNING: Graphic)

There were a lot of red flags over the course of those two years, moments I'm only now able to recognize as such. But being the daughter of a let's-look-at-our-vaginas-together feminist who is also a sex historian with a specialization in pedophilia and sex offenders—topics that were often openly discussed around me as a kid—I found that the boundaries that existed in other families simply did not exist in mine. So when my dad started talking to me openly about his past sexual encounters, it felt fairly normal. When he told me he was cheating on his current girlfriend, I was not bothered by it. I was 19, and my mother had always spoken to me like an adult. I felt he was speaking to me the same way. I felt included in his club, and I was flattered.

On my second trip to Jamaica, I started sleeping in my dad's bed. It was, in retrospect, yet another thing that might seem inappropriate to other kids. But I came from a kiss-on-the-lips relationship with both my mother and grandmother, and growing up, it was normal for us to cuddle and be affectionate together. I enjoyed it. I also had no idea what was normal in a father-daughter relationship. We held each other and I felt safe. When I started feeling sexually attracted to him—as well as shocked and horrified to realize it—I spoke of it to no one, least of all him. I hoped I would go home and the feeling would go away. But it didn't. Instead, it grew.

During that final visit to Jamaica, I discovered our sexual attraction to be mutual. It was August 2009, and one day, my dad did something that deeply upset me. The heat outside was deadly, and we stayed cooped up in his bedroom, where there was air conditioning. We were watching TV to pass the time when he put on a porn channel. Sex workers were being interviewed and he told me which of them he would most like to fuck.

I fled from the room in anger and confusion. I shut myself up in the other bedroom, which was oppressively hot, until he coaxed me to come out, apologizing repeatedly. I wanted to love him. I felt I needed him in my otherwise broken life. But things were starting to feel wrong between us. He was crossing boundaries; I was doing my best to suppress my sexual attraction to him. But despite my sense of impending doom, it was there. And then, we became sexually involved.

I imagine that, unless you have experienced genetic sexual attraction yourself, this is going to sound entirely unbelievable. But trust me: it is as real and intense as anything. The sexual feelings I had for my father felt like a dark spell that had been cast over me—a description that a therapist told me had been used almost verbatim by another client who had experienced father-daughter GSA. In general, my guiding principle in life is being in control. But in that moment I had absolutely none. It was like those nightmares in which you scream and no one hears you: you are powerless and you know it. I was not only a victim of my father's two-year seduction; I also felt a victim of my own sexual feelings. I didn't know then what GSA was, or how common it is. (The incidence rate of GSA is unquantified due to the difficulty involved in reporting or researching it; a commonly cited, if disputed, figure puts it at 50% of relatives who meet as adults.) I felt ashamed of myself, and I had no one to talk to about it. I wasn't equipped to understand or handle my feelings.

....

So here's a new story to throw into the mix: genetic sexual attraction is normal, and very real. If it is a parent-child relationship, the parent, whether male or female, is always responsible for establishing and maintaining boundaries. Failing that, they are sexual abusers. And to the victims of their abuse, I want to say what I have finally been able to understand myself: that my attraction, and what it led to, was not my fault.

The rest of the article details the author's (obvious and predictable) emotional trauma this decision produced while castigating normal father/daughter relationships; read the whole depressing thing here.